Microsoft provides a new USB driver stack for USB 3.0 in Windows 8. The new stack includes an in-box host controller driver that works with all available controllers. We recommend that you do not load a 3rd party driver for your USB 3.0 controller (or XHCI controller) on Windows 8 because of compatibility issues. Different USB 3.0 controllers vary slightly in speed, however all USB 3.0 controllers are significantly faster than 2.0 controllers.

Make sure that the xHCI controller is enabled in the BIOS

Check that your BIOS setting enables the xHCI controller. Some older systems that have been upgraded to Windows 8 allow for SuperSpeed port to be routed to an EHCI controller in the BIOS. That option disables the USB 3.0 ports of an xHCI controller and exposes only the USB 2.0 ports. Those USB 2.0 ports appear under an EHCI controller. In this image, notice that the Legacy USB Support (EHCI) option is enabled through the Auto option and XHCI handoff is Enabled.

BIOS example -xHCI controller is enabled

BIOS example -xHCI controller is enabled

Depending on your system, the option to enable an xHCI controller may or may not appear in the BIOS. If there is such an option, it might not be in the same location as shown in the image. To check your BIOS option, follow instructions from the boot screen about how to enter setup. For many systems you can do so by pressing F2, however that can be different.

Make sure that your system has the latest BIOS version (applies to upgraded systems with Intel controllers)

On some systems with Intel xHCI controllers, SuperSpeed devices can operate at a lower speed. The issue is system-related and only seen in systems that have been upgraded from Windows 7 to Windows 8. It does not apply to all systems with Intel xHCI controllers. Typically, we see the issue in a system that have an older BIOS version. Specifically, when the BIOS enables the legacy (EHCI) controller but does not display an option to disable it. That causes the port to be always routed to the EHCI controller until the BIOS is updated.

To identify if your system has an Intel xHCI controller, locate the controller in Device Manager. The controller named Intel USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller – 0100 (Microsoft) in this image experiences the issue discussed.

Contact your system vendor and get a BIOS update, if required. Those updates are usually available on the vendor’s Web site. If the newer BIOS does not fix the issue, ask your system vendor to identify a BIOS version that is compatible with Windows 8.

hi, I have the problem described in the last section, but the system has not been updated. is a native windows 8 x64 with Intel USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller – 0100 (Microsoft). this controller was not installed by me. I have already updated the BIOS to the latest version. I requested support ASRock (mb is the B75M-GL), but with no response. can you help? thanks

I've got a machine that has plenty of USB 3.0 hard drives connected to it. The machine used to have Windows 7 on it and all of the devices ran at USB 3.0 speeds. I wiped the machine and installed Windows 8.1 on the box, now only a couple of the drives run at USB 3.0 speeds, the rest run at USB 2 speeds. How do I diagnose what's going wrong? Cheers Jason.

Why are the EHCI and XHCI Hand-off settings ENABLED in the first screenshot? My understanding is enabling those settings enables a workaround for operating systems that do not natively support EHCI/XHCI hand-off. Does Windows 8 not support EHCI/XHCI hand-off?!